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Assam is a land of complex history and folklore situated in North East India where religious beliefs, both institutional and vernacular, are part and parcel of lived folk cultures. Amid the domination and growth of Goddess worshiping cults (sakta) in Assam, the sattra unit of religious and socio-cultural institutions came into being as a result of the neo-Vaishnava movement led by Sankaradeva (1449–1568) and his chief disciple Madhavadeva (1489–1596). Kalasamhati is one among the four basic religious sects of the sattras, spread mainly among the subdued communities in Assam. Mayamara could be considered a subsect under Kalasamhati. Aniruddhadeva (1553–1626) preached the Mayamara doctrine among his devotees on the north bank of the Brahmaputra river. Later his inclusive religious behaviour and magical skill influenced many locals to convert to the Mayamara faith. Ritualistic features are a very significant part of Mayamara devotee’s lives. Among the locals there are some narrative variations and disputes about stories and terminologies of the tradition. Adaptations of religious elements in their faith from Indigenous sources have led to the question of their recognition in the mainstream neo-Vaishnava order. In the context of Mayamara tradition, the connection between folklore and history is very much intertwined. Therefore, this paper focuses on marginalisation, revolt in the community and narrative interpretation on the basis of folkloristic and historical groundings. The discussion will reflect upon the beliefs, ritualistic aspects, and myths of the tradition. Fieldwork materials will be employed to discuss the tension between local practices and mainstream neo-Vaishnava influence.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/jef-2016-0004 This article offers an anthropological analysis of a conflict over the use of a set of ‘healing chains’ and other focal objects kept in the Orthodox Christian monastery of Saints Kosmas and Damian in Kuklen, Bulgaria. In a nutshell, the conflict captures the leading religious imageries propagated by the custodians of the monastery on the one hand, and the spiritual leaders of a new religious movement, so-called Deunovians, on the other. The analysis helps situate some of the significant changes currently affecting the religious culture of Orthodox Christians in Bulgaria within a broader social and cultural context.

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Under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs license, the author(s) and users are free to share (copy, distribute and transmit the contribution) under the following conditions: 1. they must attribute the contribution in the manner specified by the author or licensor, 2. they may not use this contribution for commercial purposes, 3. they may not alter, transform, or build upon this work.

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Amanik, Allan and Kami Fletcher. 2020. Till Death Do Us Part: American Ethnic Cemeteries as Borders Uncrossed. Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi. 288 pages.

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The paper deals with contemporary places of power and New Age sacred landscapes in Russia. It focuses on the Siberian village of Okunevo, its sacred sites, and their worshippers. Formation of this place of power was a result of the activity of individuals (both academics and adherents of new religious movements), combined with the specific interpretation of archaeological sites and the natural landscape of the area. The landscape around the village of Okunevo affects the interaction of people with the sacred loci and the ways the signs, symbols and narratives about them are created.

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This article is a critical study of how local place-related narratives, i.e. place-lore, is integrated into environmental discussion and how it has significant potential to illustrate local and public, as well as vernacular and institutional, meanings concerned with the environment. Combining the frameworks of ecosemiotics, environmental communication studies, and place-lore research, the article explores how a new storytelling context, ideological selection, and the logic of conflict communication influence the re-contextualisation and interpretation of place-lore. The theory is applied to an empirical examination of public discussion of Palukyla sacred hill in Central Estonia. Tracking references to previous place-lore about Palukyla Hill in the media coverage of the conflict allows a demonstration of how the contextuality and referentiality towards an extra-narrative environment that are originally present in place-lore are often overlooked or ignored in conflict discourse. This, in turn, leads to socially and ecologically disconnected discussion.

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This article looks at the perceptions of fear and ‘the frightening’ in contemporary Mongolian demonology. In the article, I discuss beliefs concerning both human and supernatural – what is supposed to be frightening for humans and what is supposed to be frightening for spirits, ghosts and demons. In daily interaction with the supernatural this mutual ‘fright’ can be regarded as an important part of communication. In this article, I discuss what is believed to be the most frightful for humans and for supernatural agents, what kinds of image this fear relates to and what the roots of these beliefs are, as well as the popular ways to confront and defend against ‘frightening’ in Mongolian folklore.
My research is based on fieldwork materials collected during annual expeditions in different parts of Mongolia (2006–2017) and Mongolian published sources such as Mongolian newspapers and journals, special editions of stories about encounters with the supernatural.

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Dajko, Nathalie and Shana Walton, eds. 2019. Language in Louisiana: Community and Culture. Jackson, MS: University Press of Mississippi. 

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Torri, Davide. 2020. Landscape, Ritual, and Identity among the Hyolmo of Nepal: Vitality of Indigenous Religions. London: Routledge. 232 pages.

Under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs license, the author(s) and users are free to share (copy, distribute and transmit the contribution) under the following conditions: 1. they must attribute the contribution in the manner specified by the author or licensor, 2. they may not use this contribution for commercial purposes, 3. they may not alter, transform, or build upon this work.

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Benovska, Milena. 2021. Orthodox Revivalism in Russia: Driving Forces and Moral Quests. Religion, Society and Government in Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet States series. London; New York, NY: Routledge. 220 pages.

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This article will look at how domestic and sexual violence against women is presented in the Icelandic folk legend collections from the 19th and early 20th centuries. Gender-based violence is a subject relatively absent in Icelandic legend collections which were mostly told, collected and published by men (the exception being the collection of Torfhildur Þorsteinssdóttir Hólm). Violence plays a role in the subordination of women, and there is good reason to consider how violence against women is portrayed in the oral legends of the past. I will among other things consider the effect these particular legends might have had on those who heard them and examine the roles of the legends in maintaining and shaping a discourse which in many cases may well have attempted to normalise this violence.

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Authors retain the following rights:

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